When does Road Man Become Jobs Man?

When the state's unemployment rolls top 10 percent.

Without jobs in Georgia, we don't need any more roads.

For the past three months as your representative on State Department of Transportation Board I have been writing the column “Road Man”. The purpose of my column was to keep you informed on transportation issues that affect you on a daily basis. As your DOT board member I will continue to work for you and keep you abreast of transportation issues that are important to North Fulton, the region and the state.  However, I am changing this column from “Road Man” to “Jobs Man." We are in unprecedented economic times and there is no other issue that is more critical to our region than job creation.

Recently the Greater North Fulton Chamber of Commerce has embarked on a bold quest for economic growth. Our Economic Development committee, under the leadership of chair Al Nash, is leading us in this effort. Why do we need an Economic Development initiative?  When I was a member of the Alpharetta City Council from 2000 to 2004, we would have meetings that would go until after midnight because we had so many re-zonings and variances on the agenda. We did not need economic development; jobs were coming as fast as we could approve the ordinances and open the buildings. Today is different story; recently two city council meetings were canceled because of a lack of applications. We must now be proactive and sell North Fulton. We must create jobs the old fashioned way: through private enterprise, by creating opportunity, unleashing vigorous entrepreneurial spirit, spurring innovation, inspiring local investment and attracting new and legacy companies to locate here.

Our six North Side cities are all unique in character and personality, which is one of our key strengths.  But we must market North Fulton as a seamless region to be successful in the economic development arena. The first part of our Economic Development agenda is to re-brand North Fulton. Once we develop our new brand we will raise the necessary funds to develop a marketing strategy with a website, collateral material and economic development professionals to implement the marketing plan.

We have a great product to sell but we cannot wait for business to come to us, we must be proactive and retain the jobs we have while recruiting more jobs to North Fulton. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions please e-mail me at brandonlbeach@aol.com.